On 7/3/2011 10:30 PM, Jason Resch wrote:
On Sun, Jul 3, 2011 at 10:32 PM, B Soroud <bsor...@gmail.com
<mailto:bsor...@gmail.com>> wrote:
"if you are thinking about consciousness, then what else could it
have been but consciousness that caused you to think about it"
Are you saying consciousness literally causes you to objectify
consciousness? Consciousness as a base is required to reflect on
consciousness... the question is whether consciousness can truly
be objectified or only falsely so.
There appears to be some confusion. This is what I am saying:
Selva asked if consciousness is causally effective. My response is a
thought experiment designed to show that it is:
1. Assume consciousness is not causally effective
2. It follows that consciousness has no effects
3. If consciousness has no effects, then whether present or not it
makes do difference in what happens
4. Consider a universe identical to this one only without any
consciousness (this is possible only in the case where consciousness
is causally inert)
5. This universe would have zombie humans that talk about
consciousness, that appear to wonder about consciousness, that write
e-mail threads about consciousness, and so on, yet all this is
happening in a universe where consciousness does not exist.
6. It seems odd that there would be zombies talking and wondering
about consciousness in a universe where there is no such thing as
consciousness.
If on the other hand, consciousness is causally effective, as I
believe it is, then zombie universes cannot be identical to our own.
Perhaps you see nothing wrong with a zombie universe with beings
wondering about consciousness, but if you do, then you should doubt
the assumption made at step 1.
Jason
You can make the parallel argument to show that the elan vital must be
causally effective too. It's like reifying "the weather" and then
asking can there be wind and rain and sunshine without "the weather".
Brent
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